


Of Healing

by Snake (Fatality145)



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: M/M, Mass Effect 3 - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-07-10
Updated: 2012-07-16
Packaged: 2017-11-09 14:04:00
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,990
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/456296
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fatality145/pseuds/Snake
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Old habits are hard to break, Shepard finds, each of the scars in his skin speaking more than words of each of his mistakes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. And Severity

**Author's Note:**

> {A series of Renegade-gone-Paragon John Shepard ficlets}

“I did everything right,”

 

                Teeth grit behind his lips, scarred knuckles pressed hard enough into the glass desk to make it crack, but not quite, shoulders curled inwards for once instead of perfectly straight and set back, a slow, shaking breath past through his clenched jaws. He had done _everything_ in his power that he could, but it was still thrown back into his face, like a cruel joke, a double edged blade tearing into him no matter which part he gripped.

 

                Every which way he looked at it, he couldn’t have done anything different and received a better outcome, but yet… What if he had done _one_ thing differently? Changed a _single_ decision? Not even just then, but out of all the choices he had ever made. He’d wracked his brain about everything ever since he had climbed aboard the Kodiak, incessantly picking out the orange sand from beneath his nails, able to feel it lingering in his deep scars, dust in his eyes, gunpowder and blood stuck to his skin and painting his hands.

 

                Half of his desk had already suffered the consequences of his own anger, datapads strewn over the ground, some of them cracked, their screens distorting. Anyone would have to admit it was a feat of strength that he hadn’t trashed the rest of the room, yet, or punched in a steel wall resulting in a broken fist and even louder cussing.

 

                “You did everything that you could,”

 

                “Then _why_ …?” Shepard growled, glaring coldly downwards, more to himself than to anything else. This was all his fault, his burden to bare, and he held much, but this just seemed like a stab in the chest from something he worked so damn hard to accomplish, a slap in the face of everything that he tried to rectify. It just wasn’t enough.

 

                He hated himself, at that moment, to each fibre of his deteriorating body, to each decrepit, ugly, ominous scar. Nothing that he did was working, he wasn’t getting better, his head was still in all the wrong places and his form showed the hideous effects, a lingering blight as seen through his sanguine glowing eyes with barely a ring of azure around the edges, basically the only remnant of himself that he had, and he felt that slowly slipping, too.

 

                Maybe all of this was stupid of him to even try. Things were easier to cope with when he went in headfirst, thoughts later – or never – getting the job done no matter what the cost and not feeling horrid about it afterwards, as he did now. Just how much Quarian blood stained him, now? The weight of a fallen Rannoch pushed down on his weakened spine.

 

He didn’t even want to think about the amount of voices that would be added to his near regular nightmares, the things that woke him up after not nearly enough sleep, and keeping him awake for the rest of the night-cycle, unable to bring himself to go back and face it again for another day, to face everything that he’d screwed up on.

 

                Yeah. It was stupid. But for different reasons. How hard was it, really, to make the right choice, to go with his heart and his head rather than his ego or bloodlust. Cybernetic scars bled and cracked down the ridge of his jaw, pulsing under his skin and sinking beneath his clothes, marking his body, sometimes painfully, sometimes numbly.

 

                “…You can’t save all of them, Shepard. Not always. You know that,” Came the attempted soothing voice, serving only to wrack a rough shudder down his being. He _did_ know that, but it didn’t make it any easier, all the blame and guilt pushing against his chest, alongside the second-hand suffering that was quickly becoming his own, making it harder to breathe, each inhale like rusted nails in his tightened lungs.

 

                “ _I know_ …” He forced out, his lips pulling back from his teeth the more he thought about his day’s work, his day’s failure. And he wouldn’t run from it, couldn’t, even if he wanted to, forcing himself to just feel the repercussions of his actions.

 

                It all seemed so easy, back then, his skin slowly crawling with the lit scars, pupils blotting out to a fiendish red, shoot first, ask questions later. Any of the issues that arose weren’t his problem, not until now, where each of them were coming back to bite him, claw at his already torn flesh. He was so self-righteous, so disgustingly self-absorbed, did whatever he needed to.

 

                “Tali is _dead_. Because of _me_.”

 

                “You did everything that you could,” The voice repeated.

 

                Roughly shaking his head, Shepard pushed himself off the desk, turning around, his lower lip actually quivering, brow knitting.

 

                “Did I? How can I be so sure? How can I be anything _less than sure_ when it ends up like this?” He spat, clenching his hands into fists, jagged nails digging into his palms, close to splitting the skin.

 

                Sighing softly, Kaidan stood up from the bed. He could see just how hard Shepard was trying, guessing that, if he wasn’t, he wouldn’t be upset whatsoever, but the pain was so clear on his face, his stance, his bitter, hurt words. The whole crew had been shaken by the happenings on Rannoch, just earlier, the Commander seeming to have been rocked the most by it.

 

It was understandable. Both the Geth and the Quarians were at his neck, and it had just crumbled, right out between his fingers. He couldn’t begin to imagine the turmoil set upon his lover, and there wasn’t too much he could do to ease it. Even now, he was still getting to know _this_ Shepard, and Shepard was still getting to know himself.

 

                “John… You can’t let this—“ Suitably interrupted by a loud bark of rage, the sound echoing against the metal walls, Kaidan could help but flinch, his expression sombre, empathetic, as he watched the other clutch his face in his hands, nails digging into the scars that webbed over his forehead and cheeks.

 

He stepped over, gently grabbing Shepard’s wrists and pulling them away from his face. The markings were something to get used to, and they didn’t bother Kaidan, not really, they even seemed to be getting better, not that their owner would be noticing any time soon.

 

                “Come on,” He murmured, Shepard’s eyes downcast and to the side, long lashes half hooded over the glowing pupils. It was eerily gorgeous, Kaidan had to admit, if he dropped the fact that it was literally tearing his face apart, letting go of his wrists and reaching down to tug up the hem of the other’s hoodie from his belly, to rid him of it. They were all tired, and they all needed rest.

 

                Beneath the clothes the scars were only worse, wider, more severe, moving along his nervous system, like Lichtenburg figures stretching out. They would be anything but comfortable, and he could see the discomfort in Shepard’s body, his tensed muscles, gut clenched up, twitching, even flecks of gooseflesh showing up along his ribs.

 

                While he might have been uncaring of those scars back in Cerberus, now they were just a reminder of what Shepard had done, what he had, but not really, accomplished, the lives he had stolen and those he never let begin. The ones on his face were bad enough, he didn’t want anyone to see the rest of them, a few, scant drops of painful moisture dripping down over his lashes after Kaidan had pulled the material over his head, leaving him shirtless.

 

                “It’ll be alright,”

 

Though the words were meant to assuage, Shepard couldn’t bring himself to believe them, the tears sickeningly sizzling into plumes as they slid over his exposed cybernetics, a pair of soft lips trailing along right behind them.    


	2. And Pain

He could hear the muffled groans, the hisses of pain that whistled between Shepard’s clenched teeth even from his place in the bathroom, over the stream of cool water that ran between his fingers, seeping into the cloth that he held.

 

                This had happened a few times before, but never this bad. Usually he would just see him tense up for a moment, breath caught in his lungs to be slowly exhaled in a tremble. Shepard was good at masking pain, having a threshold of it higher than anyone else Kaidan had met, but even he couldn’t entirely cover up the agony as his own body was literally tearing itself apart, cybernetics cracking through his flesh in glowing, mechanical scars.

 

                Sometimes, more often than not, they even bled, and, now, it was one of those times, after a particularly rough day on the field, he could practically hear the tech that held Shepard’s reconstructed body together rejecting him, peeling apart the synthetic skin.

 

                He had been yelled at to go away, more times than once, but he couldn’t just leave, not with Shepard the way he was, wringing out the cloth and cutting off the water.

 

                There were consequences in loving a man with an apparent death wish and a ticking time bomb inside his body, owner of said body trying so ridiculously hard to make it stop counting over.

 

                “Do you think Chakwas would have anything…?”

 

                “You don’t think I’ve _tried_ that before?” Came the barked, angry response.

 

                There was still that… attitude, Kaidan guessed he had to call it, the same he had gotten at Horizon when the scars weren’t even nearly half as bad as they were now, the same he had gotten for a few days after they had met again on Earth.

 

                “I… Sorry,” Shepard apologized, immediately afterwards, taking a deep breath in and holding it, rolled onto his back, covering his face with his hands only to take them away and have his fingers coated in dark blood from a fresh crack against his temple.

 

                Desperately, he would try to reign himself in, and he was getting better, but, sometimes, his pigheadedness and heated silver tongue got the better of him, resulting in outbursts just like that.

 

                “…I don’t know what to do,” He admitted, though there was more to his words, beneath his pained expression, a simple, silent plea, those striking, clouded over, red eyes glancing down at the Major where he stood at the foot of the bed, water dripping off the held cloth.

 

                “…You’re doing fine Shepard, really,” Kaidan told him, climbing up onto the covers, “You just gotta’ keep at it. You’re doing great things,”

 

                “You’re a horrible liar,”

 

                “If I didn’t think you were trying, I wouldn’t be here,”  

 

                It was blunt, but it was the truth, Shepard’s brow furrowing, half of his bleeding face pressed into the covers, still feeling like a tungsten buckshot had hit him point-blank. There was a new kind of pain, different, a disbelief, an unknown. Kaidan was someone who had dropped a lot of crap over the years, forgiven things that a normal person wouldn’t have, given up opportunities that any sane person, really, would have definitely jumped for.

 

                Kaidan was different, though. He wasn’t normal, and he wasn’t sane, not in Shepard’s eyes, simply because he was a man that had done so much just to be with him, to love him. And, while he might have been trying to change just for him, he was sure Kaidan would still be there, anyway, even if he stayed his old self. That’s just the kind of person he was.

 

                “…Sometimes easier said than done,”

 

                “If anyone can do it, Shepard—“

 

                “Yeah…” John sighed, letting his eyes shut as he felt a rivulet of blood seep down into his buzz cut from his forehead, a twinge of pain rolling through him.

 

                A shuffle over the covers and there was a sudden relief as the coldness met with his too-warm skin, water mixing with his blood and sweat, sending a more pleasant shudder down his spine as he let out that breath he’d been holding, some of the tension ebbing out of his shoulders and back.

 

                Gently his head was moved into Kaidan’s lap, that cloth working over his scars, old and new, cleaning off the dried, caked blood and wiping away the wet streaks. In a kind of tenderness not seen anywhere other than in the confines of their personal space, the Major carefully cooled him, running the doused material down the ridge of his jaw, over the amber webbing, though feeling it slowly heat through.

 

                Quirking his mouth, he placed the cloth aside, watching the trembling in Shepard’s brow, the small quake in his jaw, before placing his palms lightly over his cheeks, holding his face in his hands.

 

                “Let me try something… it might help,”

 

                “Anything sounds good at this point…”

 

                Tentative, biotic blue plumes slowly crept out from Kaidan’s fingers, in what he hoped would be an extremely toned down cryo blast, more of an icy breeze, Shepard tensing up slightly beneath him as the azure tendrils swept along the scars, some of them even seeping in. The controlled energy swept through him, alighting his hazel eyes, prickling his skin, abruptly cutting off as a sudden groan came from the other.

 

                “Does it hurt?”

 

                “N-No…” Shepard huffed a laugh, cocking a brow, eyes still shut, “…It’s perfect. Keep going,”

 

                So he did, reinitiating the extension of his biotics. They weren’t that good for anything other than defence or offence, so using them to help in a difference situation other than war was something new, something he would have to continue to work on, the muscles in Shepard’s face relaxing, his lips parting, the near-permanent lines smoothing out.

 

                The pain was still intense, but it wasn’t anything Shepard couldn’t handle, now, nails lightly grazing along a part of his throat that hadn’t been torn by cybernetics, over his prominent pulse.

 

                Slowly, he opened his heavy lids, finding those warm eyes, their colour shifting between brown and blue, looking back at him.

 

 

                “For you,”   


	3. And Comfort

On top of the fact that they just plain hurt, Shepard’s scars were distracting as all Hell, a spectacle, even. A man with crimson cracks embedded in his skin, with eyes like blood, both of which glowed even in complete darkness. It wasn’t a surprise that almost everyone and anyone who met with him would be intimidated. Shepard had that gaze that delved in further than just flesh deep, as though he could call any bullshit thrown his way (and usually did).

 

                One too many times Kaidan would trip over his words, more than usual, as he would look back at him, at the wash of red that spread out from his pupils, the ring of azure and black around the edges. It might have looked borderline demonic, yes, but that was Shepard - now, anyway - and his eyes still held that strange allure as they did the first time Kaidan had seen them. Maybe they’d change, for worse or for better, it didn’t matter, Kaidan would still hold Shepard’s scarred face in his palms and kiss over his heavy eyelids, then the web of cybernetics along his jaw each time they woke up next to each other.

 

                Though, that was getting harder and harder to come by, Kaidan found, Shepard often opting to sleep on the couch of the cabin that was more for show than anything else. Every time, he would wake up with a crick in his back that he would ignore all day, until the next night-cycle where it would just start up, again.

 

                Kaidan had offered to massage it out, and, each time, he would reject it, coming up with stupid excuses like: ‘I have work to do’ or ‘ _You_ have work to do’, even the odd ‘No rest for the wicked’, to which both of them would make faces at after Shepard would dryly laugh at his own bad joke.

 

                Shepard’s reasons for it were simple – maybe unorthodox and stupid, but simple. The reason being, if he needed to find something in the dark, he would never need a light source, only ever having to wave his arm over his desk to see everything that was there. He was alight. Always. Even he found it difficult to sleep with the glowing of his own cybernetics seeping through his eyelids; much less did Kaidan need someone who looked like they had been injected with neon all over lying next to him, keeping him awake.

 

                They both needed as much sleep as they could get, with tasks laid out daily and missions set up. And Shepard guessed catching a few more, sound hours of sleep was more important than sleeping less entangled in each other’s arms and legs, with Shepard’s lights – as he’d grown to call them – keeping them from the cusp of unconsciousness. As much as he’d never say how much he wanted it, he had to put professional parameters first.

 

                Shepard’s back already began to ache as he stood in front of the mirror of his small bathroom, palms pressed against the bench, eyes trained on himself. His body was, literally _and_ figuratively, worth millions, even if it was tearing itself apart. Literally, in that it had cost a fortune to bring him back from the dead, and, figuratively, in that too many people wanted his head on a plate, Reapers not included. It had its weight, Shepard thought, rubbing the back of his neck with calloused fingers, but it could have been worse. Miranda _could_ have installed that chip, after all. That… could have caused some complications.

 

                Ducking his head, Shepard chuckled gruffly. All things considered, he was well off, in a few aspects, which was more than he could say for a lot of other people currently suffering in the Galaxy. While he wished he could be in the thick of it, constantly, as they were, alongside them, he knew his job here was important. Uniting a Galaxy into one, huge, destructive force. That’s all that could help them, now.

 

                “Shepard. You’ve been in there for twenty minutes, and the water isn’t running,”

 

                Instantly, he turned on the tap, full blast.

 

                “It’s running,”

 

                He could almost hear the breathy sigh and deep, soft laugh in response. He knew if he stayed in there any longer he would be dragged out, biotic stasis locking him still if he tried to struggle.

 

                Cupping his hands beneath the stream, Shepard lifted the pooled water to his face, groaning, the sound rumbling in his chest, as the coolness met with his scars, some of the tension leaving his shoulders. He cut off the water, glancing aside and grabbing the hand towel to dry his face. The scars had some give, but he didn’t exactly want to test how much he could pull at them until they would rip further.

 

                He patted over his cheeks and jaw and forehead, placing it aside and thinking for a moment, eyeing his mussed up hoodie in his dirty clothes pile. It couldn’t be that bad if it didn’t have blood stains of some kind, tugging the clothing out and shaking it a bit.

 

                The door in front of him slid open with a hiss as he stepped out, making to put the jacket over his head.

 

                “You know, if you’re cold, EDI can just jack up the temperature a bit,”

 

                Pulling the hoodie down over his bare belly, Shepard glanced back at Kaidan who gave him a knowing look, his brow cocked, sitting on the bed, covers pulled back. Of course the Major knew why he usually slept alone, knew about the other’s strange insecurity over the marks. Honestly, he’d lose a few moments of sleep due to the glowing amber if it meant having a warm body in his arms, or a firm stomach and chest framing his back, soft breathes exhaled against the nape of his neck.

 

                “I’m good.” Shepard murmured, stepping down into the den and over to the couch.

 

                “Shepard,”

 

                Grunting in response, he moved to sit down on the stiff cushions, muscles groaning at him already.

 

                “ _John Doe Shepard_.”

 

                He knew that tone, stopping mid-sit and turning his head, sighing. Kaidan stretched out his crossed legs, insistently patting the space beside him.

 

                “Bed. Now. It is yours, after all.”

 

                There wasn’t much fighting to be done when Kaidan used that voice, teamed up with those puppy dog eyes and asking expression, which he pulled out when Shepard frowned. Shaking his head, Shepard relented, standing back up and padding over to the bed.

 

                “You’re the worst,”

 

                “It’s worth it,” Kaidan chuckled, watching him as he climbed in beside him. Immediately, Shepard turned onto his side, back facing the Major, shoulders curled in, as close to the edge as he could be. Tipping his head, Kaidan twisted his mouth, the lights going dark with a click of Shepard’s fingers – old earthen tech he had picked up and installed simply because he didn’t like asking EDI every time.

 

                Sometimes, Shepard put up this shell around himself, especially when he was upset, and Kaidan guessed this was bothering him more than he realized. Sliding his back down the bed, he pulled the covers up over the both of them before rolling over to face Shepard. He waited, a moment, watching the man’s shoulders rise and fall with his breath, and reached a hand out beneath the covers, palming lightly over his hip, fingers snaking beneath his hoodie.

 

                “…Go to sleep, Kaidan.” Shepard muttered, seemingly exhausted, though it was probably just a façade.

 

                He didn’t listen, though, nor did he respond, shifting over to press up against his covered back, that hand running up further, across his stomach, able to feel the serrated edges of his scars, the coarseness of the tech within them. Feeling Shepard tense up in his arms, Kaidan tenderly traced over the marks as he nudged the hood of the jacket down and away from the man’s neck, pressing his lips to his throat.

 

                “Relax,” He whispered, kissing over his pulse and hearing Shepard huff, forcing himself to fall lax in the hold. It went further than that, though, almost completely melting with a shudder as those kisses trailed to the spot just beneath his ear. Nobody knew him better, him or his body. Kaidan probably knew it better than he did himself, inside and out.

 

                Soft lips drifted down the crux of his stubbled jaw until Shepard just couldn’t take it anymore, finally turning his head to meet them with his own, firmly.

 

                They stayed like that, for a while, just lingering in the feel of each other, mouths working against one another, Shepard’s scars glowing that little bit brighter. Once near breathless, Shepard pulled back, just enough to look at Kaidan, his brow still furrowed. If only to add insult to injury, he could see Kaidan’s face clearly just from the light of his gashes in the dark.

 

                He made to turn back around, but the arms tensed tighter around him, forcing him to roll over and face the other.

 

                “ _Kaidan_ …”

 

                “Shepard, I don’t care. Come on,”

 

                Rolling his red eyes, Shepard pressed the side of his face into the pillows, covering up the worst of his facial scarring. He let his lids drop as Kaidan ducked in, pressing a hard kiss to his forehead, the arms hitching the hoodie up his back pulling him in closer, fingers running over the cybernetic webbing that stretched along his ribs.

 

                Barely lifting his eyelids, John cast a quick glance upwards, skin riddling with gooseflesh wherever Kaidan touched him. He lay still for a while, swallowing thickly, listening to the other’s rhythmic breathing and finally wrapping his arms around his torso, pushing himself in as close as possible and tucking his head beneath Kaidan’s jaw.

 

\--

 

The dark rings beneath Shepard’s eyes the next morning, when he awoke, weren’t as deep as they’d been for months on end, Kaidan found, the man’s face in his palms, kissing over each of his scars.


End file.
